An (Un)Extraordinary Wind Farm

Cruising down Highway 30 last week, on my way to Ocean City, New Jersey, I saw for the first time with my own eyes something alien and futuristic. Wind turbines.

From my seat on the 509 bus, the turbines of the Jersey-Atlantic Wind Farm appeared to rise—white, smooth, sleek—out of the Atlantic marsh. Their propeller blades turned effortlessly in the Jersey shore breeze. Rising above the landscape [webcam], they appeared powerful and galactic, sharply juxtaposed against the towering luminosity and extravagance of Atlantic City. As I scootched in my seat, craning for a better view around the bus door, I was caught off-guard by a flutter in my chest and the goofy grin on my face. Was that…excitement? I was excited? By glorified windmills? Tis’ true. And I wasn’t the only one.

Directly to my right, the rear of the bus was alive with the chatter and cranings of an older Southern couple—they hadn’t seen wind turbines “in-person” before either, they told me. I asked them what they thought of the structures: They were excited by their size. Their beauty. Their practicality. “How much power do you think they generate?” the husband asked. (1.5 MW per turbine, I’ve come to find out). We mused over what other energy-generating operations could have been there in the place of those skinny, seemingly quiet sculptures. A coal plant. A natural gas facility. An oil field. Options that would have reduced our current, relatively unmolested view to something industrial. The word reeks sooty air and diesely trucks. The man exuberantly guessed that such alternatives would have taken up “50,000 acres!” Whereas these, these slim creatures sit on only 50 acres of land and emit nothing into the atmosphere, nor leach anything in the ground. Shaking his head, he said with a grin, “They weren’t here 14 years ago.” And my chest did that fluttery thing again.

The sight of these creations straight out of the Jetsons filled me with an unexpected feeling of hope, and possibility: we have actually begun reaching that imagined cartoon future. In those five simple "windmills," I saw America (or at least New Jersey) moving forward. The country felt progressive, and positive—and I didn’t even realize it had felt the opposite. In those five spinning turbines, I felt a group of people out there championing for our planet. I almost started referring to others as, “My fellow Americans...” Ever ready to talk, I turned to my left—only to meet with a dozen riders nonchalantly snoozing, chatting, or daydreaming as the turbines wound by. For these daily riders of the 509, the view that was once an anomaly had already become simply, fabulously ordinary. Oh, the possibility.

[The Jersey-Atlantic Wind Farm is the first coastal wind farm to be built in the U.S. Each of the five towers stand 397 feet tall, and together they generate enough energy to power over 2,000 homes. Photo Credit: "Jersey Atlantic Wind Farm, Atlantic City, New Jersey," by Hypatia on flickr.com]